


Systems Alliance Instruction 53720.2

by Penthesilea1623



Series: Come Back Home [3]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/M, Fraternization, Kaidan isn't the only one who worries about breaking the rules, Shepard has doubts, fluff and worrying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-04
Updated: 2015-10-04
Packaged: 2018-04-24 20:37:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4934416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Penthesilea1623/pseuds/Penthesilea1623
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shepard and Kaidan have agreed to take their shore leave together after the Battle of the Citadel.  An extra page in her leave orders has Shepard doubting the wisdom of doing so.</p><p>From the 'signs of affection and romance' prompt on tumblr.  Requested by blacksheep33512 and crossposted on my tumblr.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Systems Alliance Instruction 53720.2

_Systems Alliance Instruction 53720.2_

_Alliance Fraternization Policy_

_“Fraternization” is the term traditionally used to identify personal relationships that contravene the customary bounds of acceptable senior-subordinate relationships. Although it has most commonly been applied to officer-enlisted relationships, fraternization also includes improper relationships and social interaction between officer members as well as between enlisted members._

_The responsibility for preventing inappropriate relationships must rest primarily on the senior. While the senior party is expected to control and preclude the development of inappropriate relationships, this policy is applicable to both members and both are accountable for their own conduct._

There was more on the page, but somehow Ophelia Shepard kept coming back to those four sentences.

She was sitting in a coffee shop across the street from Vancouver’s civilian transport hub. She was supposed to be in it, getting ready to board a shuttle to Miami, where they would catch another two shuttles before arriving at their destination – an island in the Caribbean so small that most people had never even heard of it. 

She’d been about to head out the door, and had stopped to check her documents one more time: passport, tickets and the hard copy of her leave orders (a strangely antiquated holdover of the military, the requirement that you carry a physical copy of your orders with you when on leave – not simply an electronic one). As she’d done so, a single sheet had fallen out of the folder. She’d bent to pick it up and found it was a copy of the Alliance’s fraternization policy. 

She looked up as the door opened letting in a gust of cold wind and rain. She’d messaged Kaidan to meet her here. It wasn’t him, and her eyes dropped back to the paper in front of her.

_The responsibility for preventing inappropriate relationships must rest primarily on the senior._

She hadn’t even hesitated when Kaidan had suggested they take their mandated shore leave together. Why would she? He was more of a stickler for rules and regulations, and if he was willing to toss the rule book aside so that they could spend ten days and nights that came even close to that night before Ilos she wasn’t about to argue.

Hardly something a model commanding officer should do now, was it? 

_While the senior party is expected to control and preclude the development of inappropriate relationships, this policy is applicable to both members and both are accountable for their own conduct._

So even though the primary responsibility was hers, they would both be screwed if anyone found out, and apparently someone had found out because why else would this have been slipped into her orders?

Ophelia Shepard followed the rules, not quite as zealously as Kaidan, but she believed in the chain of command. She believed the rules were, for the most part, there for a reason.

She’d managed to brush that aside when it came to her relationship with Kaidan, justifying it because of her feelings for him, assuming that his feelings for her were just as strong. 

What if she’d been wrong? What if his feelings for her … what if he didn’t have feelings for her? Oh, she knew he respected her, and liked her, but what if that something more she’d thought was there was something else? What if he’d felt pressured into making the relationship physical because she was his commanding officer? She’d scoffed when the thought first popped into her head but then she’d started thinking about it. 

On the ship it was always she who’d gone looking from him, right from the beginning. It was she who sought him out, who began their conversations, who continued them and then took them farther. She was the one who joked and teased. His replies had been strangely reserved and Christ, how many times had he brought up regulations?

And the only time he had come to her, that night before Ilos, what had she said?

_Bunk here tonight, with me._

She’d practically barked it out, like an order. She hadn’t made it a request. She hadn’t even said please.

Had he thought it was an order? 

The door to the coffeehouse opened again and this time it was Kaidan. His dark hair was wet and curlier from the rain. He was wearing jeans and a dark navy pea coat with a turtleneck underneath and had a duffel bag slung over his shoulder, not a dingy olive green military duffel like the one lying on the floor next to her, but of those fancy ones with all the extraneous pockets and compartments and zippers and velcro and in a bright royal blue. 

It seemed strange to see him in civilian clothes, like she’d caught him in his underwear or something.

He looked amazing of course.

He spotted her and gave that grin that she loved, that made her stomach do strange little flips. It lit up his face, and she couldn’t help smiling back. 

_Please don’t let him have thought it was an order._

She wasn’t even sure who she was pleading with.

He didn’t kiss her, not in public, not in Vancouver, not with so many Alliance soldiers around, and that made perfect sense, but it added to that sense of wrongness and her smile faltered.

He’d slipped into the seat opposite hers and when he saw the expression on her face his smile vanished, replaced by a worried frown. “What’s up?”

“I found this in my orders.” She said simply and slid it across to him.

He took the paper, read it, and looked up at her, his expression more guarded than it had been moments ago. “It was in your orders?” 

She nodded. “Someone knows Kaidan, not just about…” She hesitated, not sure what to call their relationship, or even if it counted as a relationship after just that one night before Ilos. “They know that we’re planning this shore leave together.” He opened his mouth as it to speak and she cut him off. “I think we should cancel the trip. Not both of us. You should still go, of course, there’s no point in both of us missing…” An ache of disappointment tightened her throat. She’d wanted this so badly, these ten days together, just the two of them. She’d wanted more than that, she’d hoped for it and had begun to dream of it, of not just ten days, but of a lifetime with him, and she suddenly realized by refusing these ten days she might be refusing everything, but the words were already spoken and she couldn’t see how to back away from the refusal now. “That night before Ilos. I shouldn’t have pressured you into it. It was a mistake.” She said, not looking at him. “We should cancel the trip. Go by yourself.”

He was quiet for so long that she finally did look up. His face was a careful mask, his mouth in a thin line, his eyes cold. Was he angry? She wasn’t certain and she realized that she’d never actually seen him angry. 

“Is that an order ma’am?” He asked.

Oh, yes. He was angry.

She felt her own mask slip into place, the Commander Shepard mask that she’d been wearing since before she even was a Commander, before she even she joined the Alliance, the one that she’d found right after Mindoir when she’d needed it to hide behind simply to be able to keep functioning. Calm, cool and collected, never stepping a foot wrong, and certainly never even considering going off on a Caribbean tryst with her direct subordinate. “It’s a request, Lieutenant.” She said brusquely. Yes, that was Commander Shepard’s voice and her way of speaking. For the first time in a very long while it felt foreign to her.

He stared at her for a few seconds, nodded and in one movement stood, scraping the chair back against the floor, scooped up his duffel and walked out the door.

She stared down at the paper unable to make out the words, puzzled as to why until there was a splash of moisture on it, and then a second one, and she realized she was crying.

She hadn’t cried since Mindoir, and how ridiculous was it that it should be this that made her cry when she hadn’t cried for Ash at Virmire, or her comrades at Elysium or any of the others she’d lost over the years since Mindoir? 

She heard the door open again but didn’t look up, not until a bright blue duffel was dropped at her feet and Kaidan crouched down in front of her. 

“Here’s the thing, Shepard. I’ve read that fraternization policy so many times that I could probably quote it back to you verbatim, and you know what? I don’t care, not any more. I didn’t sleep with you because you were my commanding officer, and I was afraid to turn you down, and the fact that you think that’s even a possibility makes me wonder if you’re really as smart as everyone says you are. I love you. I want these ten days with you and a hundred more and then a thousand, no, ten thousand more after that. I don’t care who knows it. I don’t care if it ruins your career or mine; it’s a risk I’m willing to take. I’m in love with you Ophelia Shepard and for the first time in a long time I’m willing to take a risk on the off chance that I’ll get…” His voice cracked and he paused for a moment before continuing. “On the off chance that I’ll get everything I ever wanted.” He got to his feet and looked down at her. “Now stand up, pick up your duffel and let’s get going. We’ve got a shuttle to catch.”

She stood, laughing through her tears. “Is that a request, Lieutenant?” She asked.

He picked up her duffel and his and stepping in front of her kissed her lightly on the mouth. “No.” He told her with that crooked smile. “It’s an order.”

**Author's Note:**

> Instruction 53720.2 is taken verbatim from the current fraternization regulations of the US Navy -- including the number. I figure the military holding on to their rules and regulations is something that will go on well into the 22nd century, even after we've gone into space.
> 
> photo inspirations and other Mass Effect related things can be found on my tumblr: [Come Back Home inspiration/style references](http://penthesilea1623.tumblr.com/search/Come+Back+Home)


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